translation notification

Translation of pages on this website is performed by an automated third party service, Google Translate, that generates approximations of the website's original content. The translations should not be considered exact and only used as a rough guide.

Greater Fort Lauderdale Stays On Top Among Lgbt Travelers

Gay Capital of the United States Named "Destination of the Year"
by ManAboutWorld

Greater Fort
Lauderdale, the
city with the highest concentration of same-sex couple households in the U.S., beat
out worldwide competition to be named "Destination of the Year" by the 2014 ManAboutWorld
Editors' Choice Awards, recognizing the very best in gay travel.

Greater Fort
Lauderdale continues to be a destination of choice for LGBT travelers with
hundreds of gay-owned and operated businesses and one of the country's most
diverse gay capitals. Featuring the largest Pride Center and the world's first
AIDS museum, Greater Fort Lauderdale is also home to the Stonewall Museum, one
of the only permanent spaces in the U.S. devoted to exhibitions relating to
LGBT history and culture.

"Gay-popular since the 70s, Fort Lauderdale
is still on the rise while other gay destinations are mainstreaming...with its
white sand gay beach, 16 exclusively gay guesthouses (the most of any
destination), and a nightlife scene that's busy seven nights a week," wrote
ManAboutWorld editor, Ed Salvato.

The Greater Fort Lauderdale
Convention & Visitors Bureau (GFLCVB) has been rolling out the Rainbow
Carpet since 1996, when it allocated a $35,000 gay marketing budget to create
its first dedicated LGBT ad campaign and become the first Convention &
Visitors Bureau with an LGBT-centric vacation planner and the first LGBT
website on a CVB homepage.

"We have been out, proud and
proactively welcoming LGBT visitors since 1995, and this recognition only
further motivates us to keep on bringing more targeted LGBT events to our warm,
welcoming and diverse destination," said Nicki E. Grossman, president of
the Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau.

The GFLCVB was applauded by ManAboutWorld for setting industry
standards, becoming in July 2014 the first CVB in the country to support a
repeal of its state's gay marriage ban. In another first, the CVB commissioned
the first ever survey of transgender travelers, soon to be released, furthering
its efforts to best cater to all segments of the LGBT market.

Gay Days, a vacation celebration for
the LGBT community, will take place for the first time in
Greater Fort Lauderdale in 2014, plus the
Southern Comfort Transgender Conference has signed on with the Greater Fort
Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau to bring its 2015, 2016 and 2017
events to South Florida.

"With approximately 1.3 million LGBT
travelers spending $1.4 billion a year, we continue to proudly welcome lesbian,
gay, bisexual and transgender travelers, events, meetings, businesses and
conferences," said Richard Gray, managing director for the LGBT market at the
Greater Fort Lauderdale Convention & Visitors Bureau. "We are excited to
share our sunshine with even more of the LGBT community and to continue to
better understand all the needs and interests of this important travel market."

The ManAboutWorld Editors' Choice Awards
recognize the best in gay travel that reflect the publication's values of transformative
travel through authentic and personal experiences of different peoples, places
and cultures. The magazine is the brainchild of Billy Kolber, who started the
magazine in 2012 after more than 12 years at OUT&ABOUT, which he also founded.